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10 Ways to Prepare Your IT Organization for the Next Crisis

Lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic can help IT leaders and managers get ready for the next emergency.

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Was your IT team ready for the COVID-19 pandemic? Could your network handle the load of all your employees using the VPN at once? Did you have the right security measures in place to support remote workers? Did your IT team have the right tools to allow them to work remotely as well?

No doubt most IT leaders found that they were well prepared in some areas -- and less well prepared in others. And if you are like most, you probably spent the first weeks of the pandemic putting out fires as your team struggled to adapt to the new reality. You may have even had to deal with layoffs or short-term furloughs.

Now that regions are beginning to open up, enterprises are beginning to plan for another new reality -- one that may involve a combination of remote and office work, as well as new personal protective equipment and workspace disinfection requirements for any workers that are returning to the office.

Image: Pixabay

In the midst of this next round of changes, some enterprise IT leaders are taking a step back and taking a more strategic look at their IT operations. As politicians are fond of saying, "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste." And many IT teams have discovered that the pandemic crisis pointed out weaknesses in their current infrastructure or flaws in their current strategy.

When times are good, planning for an emergency sometimes seems silly. But in the aftermath of a crisis, everyone understands that disasters do happen. Some experts suggest that this might be a good time to reflect on the lessons learned during the coronavirus lockdown and start implementing changes that could help your organization be better prepared in the future.

With that in mind, here are 10 steps you might want to consider to better prepare your IT organization for the next crisis.

Cynthia Harvey is a freelance writer and editor based in the Detroit area. She has been covering the technology industry for more than fifteen years. View Full Bio

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